


What are you doing New Year's Eve?

by SHARKMARTINI



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Baz pov, First Meeting, Getting Together, M/M, New Year's Eve, Pining, SnowBaz, breaking up, non-magic au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-10-05 08:31:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17321540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SHARKMARTINI/pseuds/SHARKMARTINI
Summary: They say that whoever you're with on New Year's Eve will be in your life for the rest of the year. Baz knows this better than anyone.





	What are you doing New Year's Eve?

**Author's Note:**

> Tried to have this ready for actual new year's and was late- as per usual.

"They're really something, aren't they?"

 

I don't bother turning around, even though I've been thinking of nothing else all night.

 

I didn't think he would find me out here, on the balcony. Someone must be sloshed- the fireworks have been going off for more than ten minutes now- and it's only quarter to midnight.

 

"They're a little early."

 

He leans on the railing next to me. I sneak a glance, and immediately wish I hadn't.

 

"Don't let me bother you, I just needed a breather."

 

"Same," I offer him a smoke from my pack but he shakes his head.

 

"Those things will kill you, you know."

 

"Can't come soon enough."

 

"Don’t talk like that," he snaps, but he's not looking at me. We're barely two minutes in and I've already pissed him off. Good.

 

"How do you know Dev?" He asks, because while he's always been shit at using his words he's somehow even worse at letting his silence talk for him.

 

I shrug and avoid his eyes, "he's my cousin."

 

"You don't look alike," he frowns, like if he stares hard enough something might stand out that reminds him of Dev. Good luck.

 

"Thank Snakes for that."

 

We both laugh a little.

 

Crowley I've missed this. Him.

 

It hits me like a knife to the heart, and all of a sudden I'm teetering on my last nerve. I didn't even want to come to this shitty party- I'd tried so hard this time to avoid it. So hard that I'd made alternate plans with Trixie, who I despise. We'd been planning to go to a party with her girlfriend. Who could have known that the party Keris was going to bring us to was the very one I was trying so hard to avoid.

 

He's smiling at me, stupid and oblivious as always.

 

I hate him a little right now. Maybe I always have.

 

The people around us start shouting as the countdown starts and I jump in surprise. I'm usually better at keeping track of the time.

 

"I need a refill," I grip my empty cup, and walk back towards the screen door. "Can I get you something?"

 

I don't bother waiting for him to reply before I duck back in to the party. He can get his own bloody beer.

 

My hand is on the door handle as the countdown ends and people start cheering and kissing.

 

I don't let myself hesitate before I let myself out onto the streets. Alone.

 

\-----

 

"Hey! Hey!"

 

It's not even a week later that he finds me. I'm halfway into my car; I could pretend that I didn't hear him, but I've already paused.

 

I'm weak.

 

He's out of breath. He really needs to start doing some kind of cardio. If he keeps this up, his diet is going to catch up with him sooner rather than later.

 

"Baz, right?" He asks, and I die a little inside. He must have asked around.

 

I've forgotten how good my name can sound in his mouth.

 

"Right," I want to smile at him, but I can't. It's still all too fresh.

 

He smiles wide enough for the both of us.

 

"I hope this isn't weird, but I was hoping to get your number. You, ah- you left before I could ask the other night." God, I'll never completely understand him. Even by my standards that conversation was subpar at best- completely unmemorable. The kind of conversation I'd have immediately forgotten if I'd had it with anyone but him.

 

I want to say no. I left early for a reason. Hoping beyond hope that maybe this time…

 

But that smile doesn't dim for a second, not even when it's obvious that I'm taking too long to answer.

 

I type my mobile number into his contacts haltingly. My real number this time, since ironically I'm not one to make the same mistakes twice.

 

\-----

 

"Jesus, fuck. Holy shit, Baz." He rolls away to the edge of the bed and scrubs his hands across his face.

 

I let myself have a small smile to myself, mostly because I know he'll be too shocked to be looking at me properly. I take a second to watch him stretched out on my sheets. I've seen it so many times but I've never learned to take it for granted.

 

"That was the best sex of my life," he says through his fingers. He sounds shocked, and it still does all the right things for my ego, even after all this time. "I have no idea what to do now. It seems like a waste to do anything else after that."

 

I've been here so many times but I know that it doesn't matter what I do. So I give in to my heart's deepest desire and run my tongue along his hipbone to taste the salt of his skin.

 

"So let's just do it again," I coax. When it comes to him there's so many things I always get wrong, but this is one thing I trust myself to know how to do just right.

 

"Fuck, yeah." And then he tugs me down until we're skin to skin and I can do nothing but surrender myself completely to feeling.

 

\-----

 

It's late and we're in bed, tangled in each other, front to back.

 

I've spent every summer since I can remember abroad. Even my secondary school was out of the country. Yet for everywhere I've been there's nowhere else I'd rather be than right here wrapped up in Snow.

 

"Baz," he whispers against my skin.

 

My breath catches in my throat.

 

It's too soon.

 

I try to turn over to see him, but he pushes against my shoulder and stops me.

 

Maybe it's for the best. I've been known to cry sometimes. My eyes are wide and I thread our fingers together and pull his hand over my heart. My pulse is racing, but I don't even care if he notices it.

 

"I love you," he says against the back of my neck. "I'm in love with you."

 

I hold his hand steady over my heart while I cry.

 

Nothing ever sounds as good as it does the first time.

 

\-----

 

I used to try and control it. But I've since learned there's no real rhyme or reason.

 

Avoiding a fight today means a new one springing up tomorrow. Turning down sex now means being insatiable in a week's time. Being honest with him when he has a question means lying to him before he can ask the next time.

 

Loving him now means losing him later.

 

"Baz," he says carefully and I always know. He has a hundred different ways of saying my name, but it has never sounded so deliberate and careful in his mouth.

 

I sit down at the kitchen table and put my head in my hands.

 

"I don't love you anymore," he says, and his favourite mug falls from my hands.

 

"I've met someone else," he says, and my knuckles grip the steering wheel so hard they turn white.

 

"I think it's best for me to move out," he says, and I stare at myself in the mirror, toothbrush in hand.

 

It's always different, but it always ends the same way.

 

\------

 

"They're really something, aren't they?"

 

I turn around.

 

Blue eyes, bronze curls. The incandescent pops of the fireworks colour him in and out of darkness.

 

When he smiles at me, I don't smile back.

 

"Are you meant to be at the party?" He asks, gesturing at the house. "The door's 'round the back."

 

"I was just on my way out actually." His smile flickers and I wonder if I've finally gotten it right.

 

"Shame, someone's going to miss out on their midnight kiss." I grimace at him.

 

"I think I've rather given up on kissing. Better yet, relationships full stop. New Year's Resolution."

 

"Sad. New Year's is supposed to be all about new opportunities ahead." I laugh a little cruelly. What opportunities does he think I have anymore? He's taken them all.

 

"Believe me, it's for the best." I look at the sky to avoid making eye contact.

 

"Is it though?" He smiles crookedly.

 

"I want it to be." I tell him truthfully. He's still looking at me, and I feel like he somehow knows, in a way that he doesn't understand or realize. I wish I could tell him.

 

"You better hurry then, they say that whoever you're with on New Year's will be in your life for the rest of the year."

 

Don't I know it.

 

"It's nothing personal," I lie to him as I fish a cigarette out of my pocket and light it, "but I'd rather start the year alone than with the wrong person."

 

He narrows his eyes at me, and I feel it like a punch to the gut. I'm more familiar with this look than I want to be.

 

"Who says I'm the wrong person for you?" He doesn't back down, even now. Even as a stranger.

 

_You do_ , I think.

 

"I meant that I'm the wrong person for you." It hurts to concede even just a little. Even after everything.

 

"You don’t know anything about me."

 

It's defensive, and a little self-righteous. He doesn't even know it's a lie. I know everything about him, and by now I'm starting to accept that as much as he's _it_ for me, I'm not the same for him. I sigh and put out my cigarette.

 

"I wish I wasn't," I tell him recklessly. "More than anything."

 

He stands his ground and stares. Anyone else would have run off by now, leaving the crazy heartbroken bloke to wax on about unrequited love by himself. I still don't know why he hasn't.

 

_Staying today means leaving tomorrow._

 

I know this, but I can't help but feel grateful that he's still there anyway. Even if I shouldn't.

 

"Awfully dramatic, aren't you?" he asks.

 

"You have no idea," I say, but it's only the truth because it's the beginning. He'll know soon- better than anyone in fact.

 

He looks thoughtful.

 

"I've never met anyone who actually believes in love at first sight and all that rubbish."

 

First sight, second sight. Six-hundred and sixty first sight. At this damned party, in my car, in my bed. Sitting at my favourite restaurant, walking up our front steps- there isn't anywhere I've seen him that I haven't loved him.

 

"No one said anything about love," I tell him instead. Because it's easier.

 

He shrugs. Then stares at me again and I watch the pink of his tongue peek out from the corner of his mouth.

 

"Why not," he shrugs.

 

"Excuse me?"

 

"What have we got to lose?" I hate that cavalier attitude. I hate it as much as I love it.

 

"I'm sure I can think of at least a few things." I let him know, because I'm always the pessimist.

 

"Well you'd better make up your mind, because  the countdown is about to start."

 

_Shit_. I check my watch. He's right.

 

I look up at him in a panic, but he's looking up at the fireworks.

 

"It's not that I don’t want to. I just- I don't want to get hurt." _Again_.

 

"Maybe you won't, we have no idea what happens next." He tells me like I'm the one being an idiot. God, I've missed him.

 

I want to believe him.

 

I turn around and stare at the sidewalk. This time I actually believe I could walk away if I wanted to.

 

I do want to.

 

I sigh.

 

"Baz," I finally give him my name, as I turn back around and walk into his personal space.

 

"Baz," he repeats and I melt. I push his curls off of his forehead and watch the lights from the fireworks flicker over his face. I let my eyes trace that path between his moles, and tell myself that it's enough- that soon I'll be able to put my lips on every one of them once more. Distantly I can hear the people at the party shouting, counting down until midnight.

 

"Simon," he finally introduces himself, and I close my eyes and let myself smile despite everything. I want to be hopeful but I already know how this goes. Already just standing here toe-to-toe with him is the beginning of the end. But I chose this.

 

I'll always choose this.

 

"Happy New Year, Simon," I whisper into the space between our faces as the cheering reaches its peak. I pull his face up to mine and kiss him soundly, a little desperately, just the way he likes best. He sighs happily into my mouth and I pull him right up against me until every part of him is touching every part of me. I tell myself that it's worth what's to come.

 

"You're good at that," he says when we finally pull away from each other. "I'm glad you decided to stay."

 

I look at his smile, and can't stop myself from smiling back.

 

"I am too."

 

And despite everything, it feels like nothing but the absolute truth.

**Author's Note:**

> I like to pick at scabs. Especially emotional ones. 
> 
> Thanks for reading. I have like 4-6 other AUs on the go- as always I'm a terribly slower writer but hope to have more to you lovelies sooner rather than later.


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